


One Two, Three, Four, Five

by fredbassett



Series: Stephen/Ryan series [81]
Category: Primeval
Genre: Gen, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-12-01
Updated: 2013-12-01
Packaged: 2018-01-03 03:49:10
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,084
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1065418
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fredbassett/pseuds/fredbassett
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Lyle copes with a rash of rodents and Lester endures something even scarier.</p>
            </blockquote>





	One Two, Three, Four, Five

“There’s nothing to worry about, Mrs Penhaligon,” Lester said as reassuringly as he could, employing the sort of voice he’d honed to perfection on excitable junior ministers.

“There is something distinctly peculiar in the middle of our bouncy castle disgorging overweight rodents,” the woman said archly. “I certainly wouldn’t describe that as an everyday occurrence here at Green Gables, Mr Lester, so I feel some concern on my part is justified.”

Another small brown shape came dashing out of the anomaly.

Lyle caught it and executed a perfect underarm throw to return it whence it came.

“Three!” chorused two little girls who were standing behind the distinctly unimpressed owner of the day nursery, watching Lyle’s antics with wide eyes.

Lyle grinned at them. “We’ll see if we can make it four, shall we?”

“I think it would be better if we took the children inside,” Lester said. “We don’t want to risk any of them being bitten.”

“Wombat!”

“Yes, possum?”

The yell from a small boy watching from the sidelines had clearly taken Lyle by surprise.

“Australian mammals were last month, cherub,” Lester told him. “I think the young gentleman is pointing out that we have another visitor.”

“Wombat!” the boy shouted again, pointing at the corner of the bouncy castle where something that did indeed closely resemble a wombat was staring around, a puzzled expression on its snub-nosed face.

“I do believe we have yet to decide on a theme for the current month,” Lester added as Lyle dived for the animal, sending the creature scurrying – or more accurately bouncing – back into the anomaly.

“Four!” Lyle’s cheerleaders intoned happily.

“Jenna and Chloe can count up to a hundred,” Mrs Penhaligan told him proudly.

Lester saw Lyle wince at the thought of that many creatures to repatriate.

“Let’s watch from inside,” Lester said firmly. He swung Jenna up onto one hip and hoisted Chloe onto the other and gave Mrs Penhaligan one of his patented pointed looks.

She clapped her hands loudly. “Back inside, children. You can still see the nice gentleman through the window.”

The main room in the nursery was a riot of colour. A woman of about 20 with purple and pink hair, a lime green teeshirt, a tartan skirt and workman’s boots was standing by the enormous bay window with some younger children, watching Lyle’s antics.

Lester swung Jenna and Chloe down onto the floor, picked up a large chalk board and asked, “Who wants to keep the score?”

* * * * *

After half an hour of bouncing recalcitrant rodents back through the anomaly, Lyle was hot, filthy, knackered and never wanted to see anything that looked like a guinea pig again. Those little sods had proved the hardest to catch, scurrying like cockroaches across the grass if they managed to make it out of the bouncy castle.

Lyle had no idea what time period the anomaly had opened into, but it looked like it was smack bang in the middle of some sort of creature colony, if the numbers were he’d been dealing with were anything to go by. Or maybe the bloody things were just running in and out of the anomaly for fun. They all looked the same to him, but he could have sworn that he’d already bunged the one with three white paws back at least twice.

The only good thing was that the anomaly looked like it was fading, so provided he could keep chucking the visitors back as fast as they came though, he’d hopefully have the whole thing wrapped up before the ARC team got there. He’d been away for the weekend with Lester visiting mad aunt Madge. They’d received a call on their way back, telling them that according to Connor’s detection device, they were close to an open anomaly. A short detour had brought them to Green Gables Day Nursery (proprietor Mrs H. Penhaligan) only about ten minutes after the anomaly had opened, and at that point the rodent incursion hadn’t spread beyond the bounds of the bouncy castle.

A brown shape came through the anomaly and started to scurry across the tough plastic surface of the bouncy castle. Lyle dived and before it even had the chance to twitch its whiskers at him, he managed to launch it back through the now-fading shards of light.

A moment later, the anomaly shimmered like an afternoon heat haze, blinked twice and disappeared.

Lyle stood up, bouncing unsteadily, and made a quick check around the castle to ensure that the nursery hadn’t acquired a new pet.

Still bouncing, he pulled his phone out of a pouch on his belt, pleased to see that it had survived his morning’s activities, and put a call through to the ARC, telling them that they could stand down the response team.

When Lyle walked into the nursery, he was greeted by a round of applause from Lester, the scary woman who ran the place and a girl who had even more impressive taste in clothing than Abby. The children joined in enthusiastically.

Lester was perched on a small, bright red plastic table, with a little boy on top of his shoulders and two other kids balanced on his knees. The two girls who’d been keeping count outside were standing in front of a chalk board and it looked like they’d been maintaining score by drawing a mouse with long whiskers for every creature he’d repatriated.

Several of the other kids were busy painting wombats, with Lester employing his skills as an art critic and making admiring noises.

When several of the children swarmed around him, Lyle began to wish he was still outside practising his fielding skills. Children made him nervous, a fact that was clearly causing his lover a great deal of amusement.

“That was fun, wasn’t it, sweetpea?” Lester said cheerfully.

One of the little girls beamed up at Lester, obviously thinking the endearment was intended for her.

Lyle grinned. Flowers were an easy one. He’d been expecting this for a while.

“I want a bouncy castle for my birthday,” he announced. “I can have one outside the ARC, can’t I, candytuft?”

He had the satisfaction of watching Lester’s eyes widen slightly in surprise.

Lyle bestowed a beaming smile on the kid who’d been keeping score. “You can chalk another one up to me,” he said smugly.

Jenna (or was it Chloe?) promptly drew another little whiskered face on the chalkboard.

He had a feeling there was soon going to be a petition for a nursery pet.


End file.
